Dragons are powerful, mobile and intelligent. Yet they don't build civilizations. Why is this so? They're not social critters. Outside of mating and mothers with hatchlings they will at best ignore each other or attempt to kill each other. They don't have human drives towards interaction, cooperation and against randomly attacking or harming others*. A hundred dragons working together could be a powerful force on paper but it would never work in practice. Dragons know this and as such avoid each other.

*that these qualities are not absolute in humans does not mean that they don't exist.

If they wanted to, a typical fantasy dragon could rule any world it exists in. But most people don’t want their setting to be ruled by the iron-scaled fist of a draconic dictator so instead, dragons spend most of their time sleeping on piles of wealth existing as barely above animals really, while still serving the age-old purpose of being slain as an anthropocentric power fantasy.

Most high fantasy dragons are portrayed as far too intelligent not to realize that if they don't curb humanoid civilization, they will continue to develop more and more dangerous weapons to finally be able to successfully kill the winged monsters that are clearly their predators. It is human nature to do this, unless the dragons were able to maintain that they were their gods, or establish a position of dominance over them, and impose limitations on their technology under threat of annihilation. Yet all the time, they remain as functionally just animals who talk, it's a silly contradiction.

>>66247395Dragons of the style you're describing and displaying are reptiles. Whatever else they are, they are reptiles.Borrowing from the traits of reptiles they lack emotional depth (or even the most fundamentally basic emotional capacity) and follow common reptilian trends of keeping to themselves and in many cases abandoning offspring as soon as feasible.

So yes they don't have human, mammalian, drive towards socialization, tribalism or empathy.Thus even "good" dragons only function with others as rulers over pathetic lower life forms or subservients to mighty gods and titans. Power and using it to go from point A to point B in their own (and only their own) lives is all even the intelligent ones genuinely care about deep down inside.

But if Jurassic Park can give a big lizard warm-blooded compassion then by all means you just go crazy as you want to go with the idea.

>>66247648>having your sigil marked on every mighty temple, grand fortress, and city wall within a hundred miles of your home>people sing your praises in the streets and powerful generals bring the fear of your name to newly conquered territories>tales of your greatness are entombed within libraries and cave walls so no one will ever forget your likeness

Civilization is for weak, squishy humans. Walls to keep the elements out. Roads to roll their wheeled vehicles and run their dominated work animals on. Farms to grow their crops. Shops and markets to distribute their goods.

What does a dragon need with any of this nonsense? A dragon thrives in the elements, roads are useless to winged flight. He hunts his prey in the wild. He takes what he wants with claw and fang, not coin. A dragon has no need to civilize the world. The world is already at his mercy.

It's a bit presumptuous to say that dragons have the exact same drives as humans, at the point you might as well ask why aren't dragon dominating every profession since they're so smart/strong.The idea is their wants/needs/drives are vastly different from our own.

BUTThere are always outliers so sure, there could very well be a dragon who instead of hoarding gold in a cave hoards competent advisors and generals in a castle and runs a nation.

Just bear and mind he'll be seen as a huge nerd by the other bigass lizards.

>>66247829It still never made sense to me. I mean think about it, most fantasy involves legendary heroes taking on dragons who are themselves legendary and cream of the crop. Yet given the fact that even normal dragons are typically above most humans, shouldn't said legendary dragons be so far above that you would need more than just a handful of powerful humanoids to even give them pause?

>>66247848What fantasy are you talking about? Because usually in stories it's about some guy who's been blessed so far out the ass as to be near invulnerable.In D&D videogames it's usually about a group of heroes who have conquered loads of foes before taking on the legendary dragon.It's important to remember that D&D was written that by level 9 you should be great legendary leaders of men, or warriors of great renown, and by level 15 you're basically a demigod among mortals.And if you're taking on dragons before that point, odds are you're beating up the dragon equivalent of a snot-nosed teenager, or even babby killing.

I can only imagine dragons feeling the need to build a city if they were surrounding by eldritch abominations or something even scarier than dragons are. A dragon's dragon, one could say.

As for how they'd look, I don't even know where to start imagining that. Are we assuming the dragons are D&D shapeshifter types? If so I guess they'd just default to small humanoids since it's most efficiently adapted to city dwelling. If not, I guess they'd just build walls around a stretch of land with mountains and cliffs and dwell in caves.

>>66247824The vast majority of oozes do not communicate and as a species overall they have an Int score of 0.There's some one-off examples that can fake an Int score by enslaving a creature that does have Int. No explanation is ever given as to why they would do this because they exist only to eat and breathe, and reproduce asexually.

>>66247814>So powerful you either have to mobilize entire armies or get lucky and have a group of plucky adventurers use every trick in the book to bring them downIf you were attempting to prove his point then good job I guess.

>>66247990How much of that is due to modern game design skewing things in favor of the players?I recall an AD&D adventure where the players are given warning ahead of time of a dragon ahead, and if they investigate they can find signs of a second dragon. If they proceed anyway, they walk in on the two dragons who due to magical senses were expecting them.The result is the party coming in through a bottleneck and being immediately hit with a breath weapon that if they fail their save leads to being blinded and immediately losing 75% of their levels (or 50% on a successful save) and having two dragons ready to kick their asses.

>>66248083>I have some sort of stupid composite of media featuring dragons so that I can contrive a non-existent scenario to make it seem like dragons are ridiculous when they're actually just used in different ways according to the media they're in

>>66248152The bigger and older the dragon grows the more set in his ways he is and the easier it gets to surprise him with unusual tactics, and the more he grows arrogant from lack of challenge. Dragon killing stories are not only about the triumph against all odds, but that no one - no matter how big and strong they are - is above defeat. The death flag for those sort of dragons is extra large.

>>66248258Pride comes before the fall. The righteous self restraint, clever inventiveness, and noble spirit of humanity will always win. Heroic knights are the bane of dragons, as soon as one exists they've already lost.

I have my dragons rule kingdoms or cities as behind the scenes forces. Basically the locals Revere them as some sort of physical god

This works great because to me, dragons are so powerful and far removed they take more joy in playing what is essentially a 5 century long game of chess with mortals instead of just torching a city.

My players understand that the dragon is more powerful than you and far more intelligent. But they have flaws that come from each ones individual personality. He may have spent a few thousand years accounting for possibilities but he has a weakness for say something stupid like fancy mirrors that he values far more than that magic sword you want

You sully the lands to breed slave cattle. You mar the forests and the mountains to build your pathetic settlements. You dot the landscape like a pox. All in pursuit of wealth and power. A desperate scramble by a horde of weakling apes. All in the name of sticking your own flag down before some other tribe does. And you DARE lecture ME on pride!?

>>66247395I can see one of the vain chromatic dragons forcing a society to create a monument in his honor, or perhaps a great mirror to admire himself, other than that what use does he have for great works? Dragons aren't builders by nature, they don't need houses to the degree humans do, they have all the weapons and armor they need naturally, they would have little need to enter a church, even if you could get somebody to build one big enough. for them, and they get their food from hunting and raiding which they are quite good at, not farming. It makes the most sense for a dragon who has dealings with a civilization to establish the usual order instead: give me tributes of livestock or healthy young women or men to feed on, or I'll burn your kingdoms to the ground. Another dragon would just get in the way of that, because they'd be competing for the same spot at the top of the food chain.

>>66247395In my setting they are shapeshifters and manipulative. They take on the form of humans or elves and use them as pawns. Because they are so long lived, they plan long plans and use subtlety to bring their plot to bear. In one sense they definitely build culture if only to use it as a tool.Most often, the PCs in my games rarely know they've talked to a dragon as he sets them up or uses them. Most often, I use dragons as my main villains and occasionally the most powerful allies.

>>66248514>Commission (read: threaten) human builders to make a statue to your beauty and power>First one makes it look too bestial>Get annoyed, eat him>Second one is a sycophant, gives it too much of the human concept of nobility he projects onto you>Get angry, eat him>Third one clearly is injecting his own human idea of attractive sexual attributes onto the figure>Get disgusted, eat him>None of them can capture your terrifying, intelligent, glorious, predatory, drconic splendor.>Give up, torch and eat their entire city, fuck back off to your mountain.

>>66248674>Titans are only 25 feet tallI glanced at this as I was scrolling by and at first assumed you were talking about 40K titans.I was going to say that I think you might be thinking meters instead of feet.

Would be interesting to see what the results of a red dragon vs Imperium titan would be.

>>66247395If I have intelligent dragons in my settings, I always sneak in dragon cults. This serves a few purposes- a. it explains why there isn't a dragon civilization any more, b. it explains the dragons horde and their accompanying dungeon.

>>66247494It's because these creatures were made up in a medieval frame, when people didn't think that one day man could have weapons to slay a creature as big as a mountain. When people look at dragons through a modern lense, of course they don't reall make sense.

>>66247758Yeah, let me tell you the story of a PC dragon who started out as a lawful good boy.

>get introduced to a dragon pup that has been raised by a lumberjack, the lumberjack died and the dragon strolled off>our (to that time still neutral to good) party accepted the young stray dragon and we wanted to somehow get him into the city without trouble to show him the wonders of society>it's a demon invasion going on>dragon thinks society sucks ass and doesn't want to go there again.>we try to bribe him with gold, he refuses>as it turns out the lumberjack was a sort of eremite that hated society and keot the dragon knowingly away from gold>life goes on, adventuring and later on we stumble upon a magical homebrew item we introduced a while ago to spice things up let's simply call it the two headed ogre magi essence>it's a sort of magical gem that you can use to give extra effects to your equipment, cut from the hearth of a two headed ogre>the dragon eats it, he ate an essence before, so what could go wrong?>he grows a second head, which is chaotic evil and obsessed with gold>is so obnoxious that he managed to talk the lawful good head into being addicted to gold as well>and so the time of the two headed dragon as our money hoard started>dragon becomes a complete gold junkie with the evil head more and more becoming the dominant one>sadly this happened to the same time the group's inquisitor and me, the group's morally questionable phallanx fighter become obsessed with "interrogating" suspects of treason to the city state that hired us>of course we loot all corpses, and of course the dragon takes the gold>pic related>become evil murderhobos in denial, especially the inquisitor, who was LN but acted more like LE, yet he was always keeping an eye on my character because I was the first to be recategorized as LE>shenanigans shenanigans>we arrive at AustriatownCont.

You know how Hobbes talked about the State, comprised of the body of the people and Ultimate Authority of the Rulers as a leviathan?

A Dragon is political leviathan as well as a physical one. Each Dragon is an intelligent, self-sufficient, single-minded and constantly armed entity, which can enforce its power on its hunting ground.The same goes for all powerful and intelligent monsters, they don't need a social contract or system of authority as each is fully capable of protecting and projecting power.

>>66249522>dragon ODs on essences and almost dies, but manages to get a deal with an evil godess to find something of equal soul value to safe his life (the godess is basically the one reaping your soul if you go too greedy on essences)>dragon gets mad and decimates austriatown to loot the gold and harvest souls and to simply be angry because he ODed without actually wanting that (swallowed a shapeshifted elf who had an essence bow)>absolutely not evil inquisitor gets mad and pvp starts>both parties have to flee later on, the group's monk and my character tried to calm both parties down>dragon comes back and steals all our gold later on, luckily I was on 0 cash anyway

Moral of the story: Dragon's and gold is a volatile mixture that can make your whole group go evil as soon as they taste the destructive power of a two headed dragon friend

>>66247395I think the reason why dragons can't work together is due to their inherent pride. Every single one of them thinks they're the smartest one in the room and most deserving of the top spot. The only way they could work together is if one of them beat the other into submission, but even then it's only a matter of time until that crumbles.

>>66247395Because they're parasocial. Like jaguars.If you take a jaguar, which will tend to hate other jaguars when it isn't trying to fuck, and then give it a genius intelligence and the ability to fly...it'll still prefer to be alone. Being smarter won't give it the physiological need for associating with other jaguars, much less associating with a community of them. Which means, no greater civilization of flying jaguars.

In my world dragons were independent and had constant territory struggles between eachother until anow abyssal threat almost ended the world and them with it. Being warned of the return of said threat they formed into a cohesive society. They successfully defended the world against said threat but almost went extinct in the process, and now the 2 remaining survivors of the species wait underground for the end they know they can't prevent.

>>66247548If we're speaking about real word legends, dragons are exemplars of sin that are only ever killed by a righteous man backed up by God.From a traditional RPG standpoint, dragons are typically some of the most dangerous things around and can only feasibly be brought down by legendary and exceptional figures, A.K.A P.Cs and specific N.P.Cs

>>66247776I'll throw an idea, but it operates on the basis Oozes are capable of any reasoning at all (Therefore they have an Int, albeit a low one), which seems necessary to even have a society.

An ooze civilization would be a swamp. Not in a swamp. The civilization IS the swamp. Oozes would still operate without a greater sense of individualism or singular purpose, instead being stirred together in a slurry where communication takes place by "physical contact" and literally temporarily melding together. Instead of ingrained social order, it's a mishmash of shortsighted cooperation for mutual benefit but with long term connections. Oozes would probably leave whenever, and new oozes would join whenever. I'm imagining some greater orchestration like bees would have, but without the direction. So the goal would be to expand the swamp, but none of the oozes would have the same goal.

Extremely simplistic hunting and gathering done by "oozing" something until its either mostly dead or all dead, and dragging the remains back to the greater swamp to be dissolved among other Oozes.

No architecture, because the oozes themselves are their entire homes and don't require more upkeep than "don't die" and "eat food". Again, just a swamp, except the water is oozes.

All along, it turns out the oozes only wanted to talk, except their talking killed you.

I remember one of the old FR books describing an adult dragon who spent a lot of effort and energy to slaughter a whole bandit fort just to steal all of their shit and make a hoard for himself.Flying back home, carrying this huge hoard, exhausted, he got jumped by a tribe of three dozen trolls.While he did kill a great deal of them, he was injured and the survivors ran off with half of his loot.The plot hook was that the dragon realized he fucked up by taking over this area (it used to be the territory of a more powerful dragon who died years prior), but he can't find a safer place to live until he can get enough treasure together to bribe the other dragons whose territories he would be passing through.

To me that kind of symbolized dragons. This young shit head thought he could just take over where an older and more powerful dragon left a vacuum, got fucked because he's not as hot shit as he thought he was, and now he is in hot water because other dragons are going to gladly kick him while he's still down.

>>66248701Because you only ever hear the tale where the dragon gets slain. Humans don't tell the stories where they die, and ordinary situations like "that guy who was incapable of killing a dragon" don't make for great legends.

>>66249891From a comic with an already absurd storyline and goofy plot twists that felt the bizzare need to make its MC learn every magic system in the entire setting. This was yet another hilarious and welcome scene.

>>66250041You might enjoy the plot, but the MC's power wank is disgusting. It starts off semi reasonable and then hits a sweet spot about midway through, and then just shits itself past a certain part that kills most if not all of the suspense and basically turns the entire plot into a character drama rather than an adventure.

>>66249705That's a pretty cool idea. Basically a sentient swamp, that to all outsiders just appears like a dead, undulating bog. Are there trees in the super ooze? I'm picturing some birches, like they would stand in a moor. What plothooks would arise from such a society? What would a group of aventurers coming across the ooze town even do, other than trying to cross it or get around it? Maybe retrieve an important item that has fallen into the center of it? (Maybe it is a jewell granting a light intelligence buff, causing the ooze to be sentient in the first place.)

>>66249962They are? I thought the one thing truely holding them back is that they aren't all that social. That, and their short life span. So information doesn't really transfer well between generations, and thus can't be amassed.

>>66247647Tf are you on that’d be lit. Imagine toppling their galaxy wide empire in a space DnD game. Not done in 5E though there’s a ton better systems for space games. Besides lore wise the future IS 90% mindflayers and aboleths. So even in your shit lore you’re wrong.

>>66250417Eagles aren't even that smart, actually. If you want smart birds, ravens are parrots are what you should be looking at.

But of course eagles do have a certain intelligence. That anon is way too absolute when saying that intelligence is mostly found in social animals. Lots of predators need intelligence, for obvious reasons.

>>66250417Yes, they're pretty damn smart. Highly social they mate for life and utilize advanced hunting techniques. One of the most distinctive mating traits in the entire animal kingdom are the "weddings" that Bald Eagles have where they both fly high into the air grasp each others talons and then free fall for several hundred feet. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UvyMl2nYBDE

Realistically because civilization only came about because humanity was knocked around by devastating natural disasters and then the disasters let up enough that humanity had the need to develop agriculture, writing, and architechture to survive the next wave. This means that Civilization is started to compensate for hardship. Thus, if a species is so strong it doesn't get affected by the weather, hunger, or anything else then it does not need civilization and will never make anything. It doesn't need to.

In truth its because they ripped off tolkien when they wrote this crap down and Smog liked squatting in dwarf holes than making his own house.

>>66251118Actually, agriculture came about because that was the simplest way to get drunk. People sure as hell weren't farming grain because they liked eating grain so much, especially if you look at how natural grain looked like before we cultivated it.

Also, Smaug isn't the first dragon to sit in dwarf holes. Fantasy authors aren't just ripping off Tolkien, they are fulfilling classic mythological tropes.

>>66251213>People sure as hell weren't farming grain because they liked eating grain so much, especially if you look at how natural grain looked like before we cultivated it.Wild grain was a very good source of calories. The bulk of the calories consumed by a Hunter/Gatherer society (outliers like the Inuit aside) comes from plant sources. Sure they'd prefer to eat meat compared to wild wheat, but if wild wheat was on hand they'd eat it because the alternative was starving to death.

Farming started in several locations within a fairly short (in geological/evolutionary terms) window of time. A shift in climate due to the end of the ice age was the most likely situation.

>>66250083I can only imagine dead trees. They were probably alive before, which makes for a better warning that "woe I probably shouldn't touch this """"water"""" , and oozes could climb the husks ala >>66251629

This is also sort of where the idea sputters out. It would be preferable to think of the Swamp as more than just an obstacle, though one that thankfully can't be brute forced from any non-magical bullshit I can think of.

The half dragon ooze sort of comes to mind as a plausible cause. Arcane experimentation that uplifted something mindless and now it wants to spread intelligence among others of its kind either to plot or out of freakish abomination loneliness. I think the plot thread of "should this new intelligent species be allowed to try to thrive and expand" would be neat, but would probably collapse under the sheer power of murderhobo and the immediate "this needs to stop" of every possible sentient race in the setting.

It could lead into a greater morality dilemma spearheaded by Druids and possibly Lizardmen cultures, perhaps even a dragon (or the Half Dragon Ooze) refusing to allow the Swamp to be culled in the interest of allowing a new sentient species and having the Oozes slowly grow more intelligent throughout the campaign for better or worse. Especially threatening once the oozes realize (like everybody else) they could just dismantle an entire community by slowly rolling over it; with the motivation of eating people. Trying to evacuate or defend the nearest town or city is a little generic, but a good start. It could lead into plot threads about establishing fortifications and walls, while finding an effective way to genocide the Swamp.

Especially neat if the Oozes could feasible spread their newfound intelligence, making even a single survivor a threat.

Finding a way to actually communicate with Oozes would be interesting in order to more directly observe them growing more intelligent over time if people want a spicy hot bath.

>>66247395>A hundred dragons working togetherThis right here is the problem, for all their brilliance, dragons can’t really wrap their brain around the concept of the “other” in all but the most abstract sense

Also, they don't need to transmit knowledge to each other to be wise, since they live very long lives and can survive a lot more stuff. They just have more learning opportunities even without oral traditions, monuments, books, schools, etc.

It's always the same old excuses. They aren't naturally inclined to, they are too proud, etc etc. Never mind that we are asked to take at face value that they are supposedly as intelligent or more so than humans despite this apparent natural limitation. It's a contradiction of behavior, and in many fantasy settings indirectly or directly results in the dragons being wiped out and dropping like flies, while they sit about doing absolutely nothing about it.

So I'm balls deep in the hatchling cloaca, it's screaming and crying for help in its draconic voice, when it's mother bursts into the room. This big old bitch of a blue dragon calls her hatchling a pussy for not being able to handle human dick at its age and promptly starts slicking it's house sized cloaca whole hurling insults at the emotionally and physically ravaged hatchling.

As I finish up, I slip the mother a sack full of gold for having to put up with such a little crying shithead, and that's when the hatchling asked for a kiss before I left. What kind of weak shit is that? I kicked it in the face and it's mother was so embarrassed by its spawn she handed back the gold and said I could use it to raise the disgrace of her making and kicked the little shit out of her den.

That's how I got this blue dragon, and that's why it's called Useless. Not good for much but dicking and kicking.

In my setting dragons are fairly powerful and intelligent but don't dominate due to a number of factors. One, they are few in number (with elder dragons being extremely rare). Two, they don't tend to get along and many have goals and desires unrelated to conquest. Usually they won't be bothered by others if they have solitary pursuits. And three, and most importantly, there are many forces on the side of Order and Chaos that would oppose attempts by dragons to rule. Gods, mortals, monsters, and even other dragons might stand in the way. Some do try but are defeated for one reason or another.

>>66253820Yes. I don't get why that is such a hard concept for you to warp your head around. Being intelligent does not necessarily mean acting rational. Intelligence is your problem solving ability, rationality is your problem recognition ability.

>>66254054Seeing how you appear to be a knower of esoteric dragon stuff, I've always been morbidly curious, just HOW much damage would amputating a great wyrm sized dragon's genitals actually do to said dragon?

>>66254300And yet even less rational people go into hysteric/defense mode at the slightest perceived chance they or their group might be threatened, to the point where they can discard their normal behavior in order to do anything to survive.

>>66254318>their groupWhy would a dragon care about dragonity as a hole? Obviously he is the most powerful of all, and those other dragons died out of sheer incompetence.

In any case, when a lot of dragons are slain at once or in a short amount of time, that is usually a big fucking deal in any fantasy setting that has dragons. Usually one dragon being killed is the stuff of legends, and most dragons would probably disregard it as a curious event. Because, again, it's not their problem.

I think you view dragons as those things that are constantly killed, and they are too dumb to do anything about it, but if that is the case, chances are the setting you play in is just kinda stupid. In 99.999% of cases, when a man meets a dragon, the man dies. You just happen to play as the 0,001% that survive.

>>66254393>Obviously he is the most powerful of all, and those other dragons died out of sheer incompetence.That is the cliche mindset of a typical fantasy dragon, yes. That every one of them ultimately sees themselves as some sort of god and fails to see their own weaknesses which kills them. Every single one falls into the exact same trap thinking things will be different for them. You would think that even basic pattern recognition would be a factor for something that can live long enough to learn from the mistakes of countless others over the course of history.

>>66254506Yeah, because humans never repeat dumb mistakes, right?Which setting are we exactly talking about where two dragons make the same mistake and die because of it? Because usually a setting where a dragon dies the standard hybris death where one scale in his chest was loose or whatever, that is a singular event and, again, the stuff of legends.In settings where there are a bunch of dragons flying around all at once, they tend to be a bit not that powerful and can be killed by basic archery or some good spear most of the time.

>>66247395The way I see it, the hoard mentality always kills draconic civilization. Chromatic dragons are too greedy to cooperate for long and metallic dragons will micromanage everything to the point where conflict arises over who should be calling the shots. Either way dragons wouldn't be able to cooperate and would probably be better off hiding in caves or lording over small populations of other races on their own.

>>66254302Well, it's a fight ending critical wound. The problem is getting a great wyrm to whip it's dick out in the first place and then you got an elm wood sized dong that you better be bringing a vorpal sword to use against.

Honestly, it would make more sense to get the gnomes to essentially make an elaborate dragon themed real doll with a fuck huge guilottine trap hidden in the cloaca with a trigger system at a deeper portion of the vag to ensure it hacks the base really good. Although I'm unfamiliar with dragon dongs, they might have a knot or something.

>>66251629That is actually a really cool image; it looms like dead trees, but as the party gets close they see a bird fly too close to the top, and an ooze shoots out like foam from a fire extinguisher, engulfs it, and pulls it back to ground.

>>66256316I remember when dragons used to be portrayed as more monstrous, if not outright like a serpent they were bloated and not at all appealing, or more insidious and ugly. But then, we have more modern interpretations that make them majestic, muscular, and healthy looking.

>>66256316>cat-like flying lizardsNow imagine if this was 5x the size, smarter than you, with sleek exotic scales, inherently magical and is the embodiment of fantasy in general for a lot of kids that grew up reading trashy novels

Too blunt to get through the tough hide. A portculis would be a pretty effective middle finger though, but it wouldn't die very fast if at all from the wounds inflicted and now you got an angry dragon to contend with.

>>66257522What sort of environmental hazards would you suggest using in a small fort, if say available weapons were inadequate and the populace undermanned? Talking desperate measures to get an unlikely kill or repel via de-dicking a drunk dragon that the group otherwise have no business even trying to fight.

Agriculture was almost certainly initially developed by fringe peoples. The successful groups claimed good hunting grounds, gathering sites and so on. Groups which had no access to said good grounds had to make do with lesser resources, like shitty wild grasses which could be collected for grain at a massive effort. Then someone had an idea to try and cultivate them and eventually you end up with plants actually worth the effort, in which case they get widely adopted.

Gets complicated, but odds are low it will be a black or green dragon since their environments of choice are usually not typically inhabited by humans so a highly corrosive acid is a good idea. Proper placement of gelatinous cubes could be effective for quick dick dissolving and in the case the dragon resheathes the dong the slimes just go along and start doing internal damage. This isn't an instant kill, but should be damaging enough and constant enough for the dragon to bug out to deal with the issue while the population in the fort books it or man's a ballista or two to pepper the bastard to death while it freaks the hell out like a guy who shoved his dick into a fire ant nest who somehow got inside his ball sack before unleashing the stings.

Alternatively, still go with guillotine, just make it out of glass. It only needs to work once, afterall.

>>66247395Personally when the matter of dragons ruling the world comes up for me I’ve always sort of pictured the end result something akin to a continental stretch of land broken up into a thousand+ little duchies that are of the same size caliber as the most tightly packed bits of Holy Roman Empire border gore. Single valleys which constitute a natural territorial extent of a given dragon’s ability to patrol just sort of naturally turn into their own little dukedoms with a Dragon hanging out in a great big stone mansion or renovated cave or what have you.

>>66258947Relative to size, a 3 for thick door made of solid steel would be akin to dropping a 1 inch thick index card piece of steel on your dick from your belly button.

It wouldn't feel nice, but wouldn't hurt much. Get a 30 foot long piece of marble that is 5 foot thick and has a retarded amount of extra weight on it and drop it from about forty feet high and it would be akin to dropping a concrete block slab onto your dick from five feet high which might make it burst.

Really, a couple of swinging chain trap logs that clap together with sharpened points would probably do suffice damage.

>>66254982Not the guy you're responding to, but they certainly would hear about it, they just don't give a fuck. I don't think you understand the sheer arrogance of dragons in most settings. Clearly the dragon that died made a stupid mistake and/or the human in question got so absurdly lucky that the odds of it happening again are basically nil. It totally won't happen to THEM, they're so much smarter and stronger than that dumbass who got killed.

>>66247395They only care about gold and siring broods. They do rule the world. One dragon could potentially end civilization if it felt like it, but instead it would rather sire a brood then sleep with its plunder for 50 years, rinse repeat.

>>66262058Actually one was planning on it but now she's withholding, at least within this country because she doesn't want to risk getting cucked and saddled with her husband's half-dragon.

Someone did joke about abusing the doctrine though as a chance to get to bang the queen. But we're not trying to play a game where we overthrow her or something. Just seems like a hopeless endeavor anyway.

>>66262103>Actually one was planning on it but now she's withholding, at least within this country because she doesn't want to risk getting cucked and saddled with her husband's half-dragon.>Not trying to go for a threesome with the dragoness queenShe's got shit tastes

Most dragons I've got going tend to run other races civilizations. Being among the most "godlike" of mortal beings to not actually be divine in any way, they as a collection of species have an urge to rule, but cannot rule eachother to much effect, so they use their power to force themselves into a dictating position within a culture of their fancy. Sometimes this works out for them, sometimes it doesn't, and sometimes things go in a direction that makes weighing the pros and cons very difficult.Despite usually presenting themselves as experienced conquerors and masters of the arcane, the few that don't suffer rebellions often end up learning more than they teach over the course of their appropriation of a civilization. Concepts like abusing capital-based systems to hoard wealth, or applying one's own power and knowledge of the universe into toolmaking, are things that blow the minds of dragons as on their own they never really encountered the direct need to have innovated these.

>>66248360Angel cannot a be a righteous creature by definition. Obeying God is their fundamental nature, and thus there is no virtue in it. Only a free-willed creature such as man can be righteous, as it is flawed and burdened by sin, but still chooses the virtuous path.

>>66247508>reptiles>lack the most fundamentally basic emotional capacity... Excuse me?Not all reptiles are emotionless. They're different from mammals for sure, and they express their emotions in different ways, and it's true they don't tend to be as social, but some are. And needing to start the day with a good preheating doesn't change that.

>>66247571https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maslow%27s_hierarchy_of_needsThe rest of the hierarchy. I assume a dragon doesn't care too much about love/belonging, but esteem and self-actualization are up there.

Plus entertainment. Humans play SimCity and Civilization on the computer. Dragons can play it in real life.

>>66247672Killer whales are some of the strongest creatures on earth individually, able to solo body most of their prey, and still live in pods. Not quite civilization but about as close as anything neither human nor eusocial gets.

If a dragon ruled as a king, and took many wives during his vast lifetime, outliving his wives and entire generations of his mortal descendents, but then suddenly died, who do you think comes next in succession?

The eldest living male descendent from his first wife or the daughter from the wife just before he died? I don't know dick about how monarchies work.

>>66268217the eldest and most fit to rule i'd say, this could be his eldest son from his first wife or his youngest son from his last wife depending on how many of his children are even alive or capable of ruling. depends if the kingdom prefers boys or girls as the ruler also

>>66268217Whoever has the most immediate leverage. The system is too unusual to draw parallels with existing succession laws, and even then history knows HUNDREDS of said laws and their systems, and EVEN THEN they were often disregarded because a pen is not actually mightier than a sword.

>>66268240>>66268247Cool. The fact that there wasn't an immediate obvious answer means there's enough mental wiggle room that I can pretty much do whatever I want for internal logic. It was a setup for a not!France setting in a campaign I was planning with the nobility all being related to the original dragon king by blood and they're all conniving for the throne because of the power vacuum left by his death.

>>66247395The thing about dragons is that they're not extroverts (Bronze excluded) and get mental energy from solitude more than social situations.Some of the lower-int dragons don't realize this and try to rule human/kobold/dwarven cities, but end up getting really fucking annoyed at all these pissants petty problems and social intrigues. They understand them all. They can see how they'll play out 12 moves in advance. It's like a young child who insists on explaining things you already know to you, except the kid's not yours and it hasn't gotten any smarter over 12 years.So they eventually fuck off to live in solitude because fuck other people.

In any real world setting we would literally have to nuke them. ...and even that isn't likely to work (wall of force, prismatic sphere, control weather (planes and missiles fall from the sky), reverse gravity, etc.). We would be so completely fucked.

Even in a magical world, any DM who just lets the party win is an idiot who knows nothing of strategy.

Dragons aren't just bags of bloated hit points. Their very nearly gods.

>>66270992If the dragons in all those stories, which is what we're talking about (so save your smartassery for someone who cares), we would be fucked. Unfortunately a lot of faggy, limp dicked, loser GMs play dragons as if dragons are just stupid lizards so they can give their players unearned experience points and be all like..."Yeah, my party took on a dragon. It was so cool. Derp. Derp.". ...and fags like that deserve to be slapped for their utter stupidity.

>>66270960Settings vary. Old myths have dragons as nothing but pests. If dragons were real than we can assume magic is real among other things that humans can use. Then what's to stop a group of people from learning magic and slaying a dragon. After all the most consistent theme with dragons is they live alone. Often times it's a team that defeats them.

>>66271032Mega fauna have none of the advantages dragons have aside from size. People like you are exactly what is wrong with D&D these days. MMORPGers will never understand anything beyond monsters being hit point, experience, and gold coin bags. They never actually have to face a real challenge. Ever.

Dragons should make your players shit their pants. Not make them rub their greedy little hands together in anticipation.

I always run dragons as ruthlessly and as intelligently as possible. Most players have their characters die after a few elementals summoned by a dragon kill them off. The smart characters run.

When actually faced with the dragon itself (assuming they got past all its guardians, traps, tricks, distractions, etc.), it is rare for them to win, but when they do, they feel as if they EARNED that victory, because they DID. They also remember that encounter forever, have funerals for those that died, etc. Roleplaying actually becomes roleplaying instead of ROLLplaying.

>>66270960Dragons have no society, no technology, nothing. Fantasy plays them up as smart, smarter even than humans, but they live no differently from animals and often make the stupidest mistakes possible when confronted with persistent and relentless enemies that won't just lay down and die.

>>66247395Gold dragons kinda dohttps://youtu.be/NN-TSzhzC6wThe head gold dragon rules the world of gold dragons, and each one control their own bits as far as i recall.I think silvers also have a tribe or something, i can't recall, but they have to ask yhe elder for permission to breed with another dragon and it is advized to be other tribes

>>66247395It ultimately boils down to this: they don't need to. They're perfectly happy in caves, stealing treasure, eating livestock, and hibernating for most of the time. Humans inherently created civilisation as a means to have an easier life. Dragons already have it easy.

>>66247395The villain in my current campaign is a dragon who's a high official in a government and plans to unearth ancient artifacts to further his rule. He does have a dragon hoard and all that but the dragon hoard is like step 1 for a dragon, once he has amassed wealth he invests it in power. Because dragons are all about power. Am I doing it wrong then?

>>66247395Speak for yourself, I routinely have an area called "the Draconic Kingdoms" in my settings that is ruled by virtuous dragons. Mostly for evil dragons I keep them as the standard loot hoarding village burning type. But even they will often rule civilizations of kobalds or lizardmen and I don't think that's out of place even in most standard DnD settings.

Then of course there's the "secret dragon king". If you've got an immortal king that claims to be a demigod, have drank from the fountain of eternal youth, or whatever other form of immortality, its basically a crapshoot as to whether he's a dragon, vampire or demon in disguise (or possibly telling the truth?)

>>66247395because they, like humans, have different opinions and desires, which split them into subgroups, in this case chromatic, which are evil in most cases as they worship Tiamat, and the metallic dragons worship Bahumat as the good and just one, and because of that infighting inevitably breaks out and what survivors last scatter and stick to themselves or small groups.

Dragons are iconic antagonistic creatures that represent that which men hate and must destroy in order to better oneself. All kinds of Dragons should always strictly be simple evil beasts or destructive mindless creatures that only exist to destroy. Any changes to this tried and true formula just results in cringe. The only people who like that shit are furfags.

A large population of dragons is highly unsustainable, and food will become extremely scarce.

>Lazy and sleep often. Bad for civilization which needs workers to build, create goods, and farm.

Dragons would probably resort to just taking what they want from nearby places, becoming a very raiding and warlike civilization that will only earn them the ire of their neighbors.

>Arrogant. "Why should I be the farmer!? I'm obviously the best candidate to be the ruler!"

Dragons would be extremely unstable around each other if power and wealth are on the line, and for the sake of maintaining their image, they will very commonly employ proxy battles against their political rivals to cover their tracks.

>The only workaround to these problems is enslaving other races to do the menial work.

Unlike kobolds, not a lot of races will tolerate this arrangement for long, and will likely cause dragons to become the target of mass rioting on a world scale.

>>66254743well we dont repeat the mistake .... has somebody talk about going to russia in winter is a good idea ? underestemating russians ? Gustavus Adolphus of Sweden, the short frenchman and this crazy austrian want to talk about this

>>66247395Simple: Why would they bother? Society didn't just poof into existence because it was bound to happen, statistically. Civilizations and trade networks and governments evolved out a system of incentives and human needs which dragons simply do not have. Anything they desires can be achieved through means which require significantly less work than creating a tax structure.

>>66270855"Man kills dragon" is worthy of a story. "Dragon kills man" is about as interesting as "Barack Obama buys a sandwich"

>>66247561>why doesn't a largely subterranean race make buildings abovegroundA mountain becomes a fortress. Wherever the dragon is, is their place of worship. Armor, weapons, magic items, these are plentiful (mostly by theft), but only used by permission of the dragon. That said, if the dragon's main chamber isn't well-decorated with fine sculpting of the walls, possibly with magnificent stone effigies of the dragon, they have faulty kobolds.

>>66255230>inadvertantly>his breakfast he caught just happened to be a feared wizard>scrawny little bastard, had to go find a deer afterwards to sate his appetite>three days later, some humans are cheering and singing happy songs about what they assumed must have been a terrible battle>dragon literally just bit his head off while he was resting in a forest

>>66249922Exception: rather funny stories.>A man left Chelm to explore the world, and visited a town plagued by a dragon. Hearing of the tragedy the beast brought upon the residents, the man decided to kill the dragon. He thought to himself,>"I should visit the wise men of this town and learn how to deal with such a creature.">"But if they were truly wise, they would already have defeated it. So there are no wise men in this city.">"But from Chelm, our wise men can solve any problem! So I should ask the wisest man of Chelm.">He looked all throughout the town, but he could find no other person from his hometown. Seeing as he himself was the wisest man of Chelm around, he consulted himself.>"What makes a dragon different from another dangerous beast? His fire breath, and his scales. If I avoid both, it will be as though killing a large wolf.">"To avoid his scales on the outside, I must strike his insides. But his mouth is where fire comes from, so I must not go through his mouth. I will instead go through his nose instead, and that way harm his head.">"Now for what to use. I do not have a sword, but that is fine - others have tried with a sword, and failed. So a sword will merely lead to failure. A sword cuts and slashes, so a weapon that does neither will do best. As the wisest man of Chelm, then, I will use a hammer to crush the dragon's brain through his nose!">The dragon disagreed.>The town of Chelm was told news of the man's death. After the funeral, the smartest men in Chelm gathered to discuss what should have been done, at the request of the messenger. An hour later, they have an answer.>"The fire spread from its mouth to him. He ought to have fed the dragon flour, and thus smothered its flames."

>>66296091>Isn't there a ritual a dragon can perform to ascend to deityhood? Involves eating all of their hoard or something.Yep, though depending on how she defines her hoard, the kobold may be on the menu as well

>>66302302It's an anthropocentric fantasy. When we win, and we always do in the end, it's to show that we were victorious against the most beastly and strong of enemies. Dragons exist to be slain in order for us to get our egotistical rocks off while doing so. The dragon slaying fantasy fulfills the exact opposite role of the Lovecraftian. It's a paper tiger.

>>66247395Because any dragon that attempts to rule an actual civilization is quickly stomped by legendary heroes. Sure, dragons are far more powerful on average but they can't compare to the statistical outliers of the other races, and the incredibly high rate at which these races reproduce.

Because they don't work together. It's like the old saying about elves, dwarves, and humans.

Say there's a magic location that needs to be protected for 200 years.A dwarf will build a dungeon full of traps, puzzles, and fake treasure rooms. Dwarves live long, and build longer; they believe in hard work and craftsmanship.An elf will just... guard it. They'll hide it, then hang out nearby for 200 years, assassinating or misleading anyone who gets too close. They'll just do it themselves.A human will found an order of knights to guard it. Humans don't live long, so when they want to do something worthwhile they have to create a group that will outlast them.

Dragons are like elves, except even more extreme. They're unique, each one a legend.

Except of course in the many, many settings where dragons are either more common or more social and do work together all the damn time.

>>66249120Well, in a straight-up fight, the titan is extremely likely to win, because its weapon/armor/shields are just way better than the physical/breath weapon output of the dragon.

If the dragon isn't dumb, though, instead of allowing a straight-up fight, it uses plane shift or limited wish on the titan to dump it somewhere hazardous, use polymorph and teleport to transport inside and attack the operators directly, etc. Basically just high-end wizard tactics, as aided by still having all the dragon stats at human size.

For dragons who are merely powerful apex predators or forces of nature with the intellect of a raccoon or a dog, how do we explain them not infesting the world and destroying every civilization? If they are beasts, they had to come from some evolutionary process, therefore men couldn't succeed on creating civilization because they already have trouble with them in the medieval era, dragons would have annihilated early men with ease. They don't have any natural predators, and possibly never had, so they could just reproduce as much as they like and kill nearly everything.

How do we fix bestial dragons? (Arguably the best and only way to run dragons in most systems)

>>66305168Shouldn't 1 legendary dragon still be > than a handful of legendary heroes most of the time then? And shouldn't said dragon become even stronger each time it learns from the last group of heroes who failed?

>>66305317Their descendants would be weaker since only those who were not threatening enough and passive enough would be the ones with a chance to be domesticated. Eventually they would become a much weaker breed but still useful to whoever was able to train them, particularly as tools of war.

>>66247427I personally like them being the big fallen empire that has to exist for unreplicable magic items and ruins to exist everywhere.

Dragons were the rulers, and also the heavy cavalry. Dragonborn were the officers, specialists, and knighthood (born as in, they rode, which the other two classes did not). Kobolds were the footsoldiers and peasantry.

When Tiamat and Bahamut split so too did the dragons. The royalty split into Eastern Good Metallics and Western Evil Chromatics. Those that didn't kill each other off scattered, each to rule their pile of dirt somewhere.